AI will bring ‘more opportunity than downside,’ Lockheed Martin executive predicts
AIAA AVIATION FORUM, San Diego — Artificial intelligence is unlikely to produce “the next great leap,” but its use can generate revolutionary types of capabilities, a Lockheed Martin executive said here today.
Renee Pasman, chief information officer at Lockheed Martin’s aeronautics business, acknowledged that many worry about AI’s effect on the job market, but said these tools are more likely to affect job structure and that previous technologies too have changed the available jobs.
“I also expect that we will see a lot of job opportunities open up, whether those are in development of AI or with unique applications of AI,” Pasman said. “There’s a lot of hype; the reality is a bit different. And then as the technology settles in, I think we’ll see a lot more opportunity than downside.”
Asked whether she would characterize AI as evolutionary or revolutionary, Pasman said “the application of certain AI models and approaches [does] lead to revolutionary types of capabilities.”
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“There are things that we can do now that we could not do without it,” she added. However, “this idea that AI is somehow going to come up with the next great leap, particularly if you’re talking about the large language models, a lot of that is inherently derivative. It’s based on the knowledge that is already there.”
At Lockheed, Pasman said AI has proven useful for accelerating workflows and in program management.
But she noted there remain challenges, such as validating its output.
“If it generates a lot of non-productive friction because we have to check everything, then that’s not great,” Pasman said. “So how do you build that trust on both sides?”
